If you'd have asked me a year ago, did I ever think it was possible to fall in love with a mouse, I'd have laughed, hard. Kind of like the time I laughed in the first grade lunchroom and power-shot milk through my nose all over Heather Troxell's new dress.

But thirty three years later I am not laughing. Well, I am, but at myself and the absurdity of my love affair. This mouse - my mouse - who's just turned four months old and lives inside my pocket is a testament to opposites attracting. Could there be a more unlikely pair? Little mouse and brazen woman? Contemplating unlikely inter-species relationships yesterday, I was reminded of the moment in An American Tail where Fievel meets Tiger, a big fluffy orange cat, and they become the unlikeliest of friends.

I feel alot like Tiger these days, with a little Fievel tucked in my shirt. He nestles against my skin all day long, sleeping, then wakes to wash his face and whiskers, eats peanuts and sunflower seeds from my fingers, and then goes to play in his Mousie Dream Home all night while I sleep. 

I always LOVED the scene in American Tail where Fievel meets Tiger and they sing "We're a Duo." I've used that song many times in my life to describe unlikely friendships. And now, with this little guy asleep on my shoulder, I can't get it out of my head. Let's sing! All together now!

Tg: I can tell,
we've got an awful lot,
in common,
even though,
we look as different as can be!
We don't even have to try,
to see things eye to eye,
it just comes to us, naturally!
Come to think of it I think we fit together,
playing cat and mouse won't get us, very far!
There's no need to fued and fuss,
when it isn't really us,
Let's you and me be who we are.

We're a duo,
a duo,
a pair of lonely ones who were meant to be a two!
Oh, a duo,
it's true-o,
wherever we go, we're going me and you!

Halt! There's a mouse in my bra and I'm not afraid to use it!

Seriously. Now, before you start signing me up for the freak show, lemme tell you that it started as a matter of practicality, not as a penchant for eccentricity. You see, infant mice must be fed every two hours and I live in the boonies. Well, not in The Boonies, more like boonie suburbs. To get into town takes me 20 minutes, so I no sooner go for a walk in the graveyard and go poking my nose into the local cafe before I have to turn around and go right back home to feed the little milk-maws.

"Necessity is the mother of all invention"~ Plato

Indeed. I can't be rattling around dirt roads all day in a car. No-can-do. So invention to the rescue! May I present...the Mother Goose Kangaroo Joey Pouch Three Blind Mice Transport Sports Bra!! I'm pretty sure I'm the mother of this particular invention and am confident they'll be sweeping the nation soon. *Dollar signs flashing in eyeballs* I mean, every woman needs a solution to her baby-blind mouse problem, yanno?

And yes, before you ask, mice are notoriously, conspicuously, obsessively ardent clean freaks. For those of you who are into that kinda thing (if you must know) They wiggle when they want out. I put them on a paper towel and voila! Instant potty training. And their two-hour feeding schedule? Well, let's just say they wiggle when they're hungry too. I travel with puppy milk formula in the car, so I'm ready when they are, though I swear with all the joey-pouch action I'm starting to lactate.

Now I know what you're thinking. But face it: That hoopla created when Michael Jackson started dating Bubbles the Chimp? All for naught. People thought he was whako and look--He turned out just fine...